


All Creatures Great and Small

by AppleSeeds



Series: Noah's Ark Zoo [1]
Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Alternate Universe - Human, Flirting, M/M, Oblivious Aziraphale (Good Omens), Shy Aziraphale (Good Omens), The animals ship them, Zookeeper Crowley
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-14
Updated: 2020-12-14
Packaged: 2021-03-11 04:08:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28069059
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AppleSeeds/pseuds/AppleSeeds
Summary: It seems like every time something embarrassing happens to Aziraphale in his job at Noah's Ark Zoo, the stunningly handsome zookeeper Crowley is always there to deal with it. Aziraphale isn't really sure whether this is a blessing or a curse.
Relationships: Aziraphale & Crowley (Good Omens), Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Series: Noah's Ark Zoo [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2059875
Comments: 28
Kudos: 192
Collections: Good Omens Human AUs





	All Creatures Great and Small

**Author's Note:**

> I've had a really bad week so I gave into temptation and wrote a zookeeper Crowley fic to lift my spirits... hope you enjoy it! :-) Thank you to KissMyAsthma and the fic club on Twitter for discussing my ideas for this fic with me and also for cheering me up and being so supportive as all the bad news kept rolling in this week! I'm very grateful to you all! <3

_Why_? Why was _Crowley_ always the zookeeper on duty when things went wrong for Aziraphale? _Crowley_ , stunningly handsome _Crowley_ , with his long, sleek, copper hair tied up messily in a half-bun, his stylish sunglasses and little snake tattoo next to his ear, his breathtaking, heart-stopping smile and his ridiculously tight black polo shirt and khakis... it always seemed to be _Crowley_ preparing the food when Aziraphale was on the rota to do the public talks about the animals. It was really starting to feel like someone was playing some kind of practical joke on him.

Aziraphale watched with horror as the elephant turned the bucket upside down with her trunk, all of the vegetables falling into her mouth while the visitors applauded. Apparently they thought that was _supposed_ to happen. Aziraphale grimaced and sneaked off back into the large mammal kitchen.

“Excuse me, Crowley, I’m so sorry to bother you,” Aziraphale murmured sheepishly from the doorway, his breath catching the same way it did every time he looked at Crowley. His heart fluttered and he nervously fidgeted with his hands in front of him as Crowley nudged the fridge closed with his hip and turned to face him.

“Hey, that was quick! You ok?”

“Yes, well... sorry, I haven’t actually done the talk yet. You see, I put the bucket of food down, and I thought I was more than far enough away from the fence, but apparently not. I’m afraid Rainbow reached over and took everything, including the bucket. I really am terribly sorry.”

Crowley smiled and raised his eyebrows, clearly amused by Aziraphale’s incompetence, and Aziraphale hunched his shoulders and shrunk into himself even more.

“S’not the first time, she’s a circus rescue, remember? They trained her to do all sorts of things. Big brains, elephants. I’ll tell Adam and he can retrieve the bucket next time he’s in the enclosure. Just grab some of those potatoes for now for your talk.” Crowley tilted his head towards a crate full of vegetables in the corner, and bent over to pick up another bucket for Aziraphale to put them in. Aziraphale should probably have looked away, but instead he watched intently as Crowley’s black polo shirt rode up slightly, revealing a smooth patch of skin above his snakeskin-effect belt. Aziraphale swallowed and stepped over to the crate of vegetables, distracting himself from the inappropriate thoughts he was having by concentrating on choosing some good potatoes.

The week after, Aziraphale found himself once again sheepishly eliciting Crowley’s attention, this time in the tiny hut next to the lemur walkthrough. Aziraphale had arrived a few minutes earlier than the scheduled time for the public talk and feed, but had collected the box of food Crowley had prepared for him and entered the enclosure anyway. When Aziraphale didn’t immediately begin feeding them, the lemurs had jumped all over him, frantically trying to prise the lid off the plastic container full of food. In his frustration, one of the lemurs had bitten Aziraphale in the arm. Fortunately, he had been wearing his Noah’s Ark Zoo branded fleecy jumper on top of his polo shirt, which hid the evidence, and none of the visitors had seemed to notice. Aziraphale had managed to get through the talk successfully, ignoring the sharp pain in his arm until it was over, before returning the plastic tub to the hut.

Crowley reached out and took it from him, giving him one of those ridiculously bright smiles that made the whole world seem to glow a little bit. “Great, thanks. You ok?”

“Not really,” Aziraphale mumbled, cringing internally. Seriously, _why_? Why was it _always_ Crowley?

“What’s up?” Crowley’s smile disappeared instantaneously, now looking at Aziraphale with caring concern. Somehow that was worse. Aziraphale’s stomach flopped about like a tuna on the deck of a fishing boat.

“One of them bit me.”

Crowley winced and looked Aziraphale up and down. Aziraphale hoped Crowley didn’t notice the way he shuddered when he drew his next breath.

“Let me see,” Crowley insisted, a firm, serious tone that made Aziraphale tremble and turned his legs to jelly. Aziraphale had no choice but to flop down onto the small stool in the hut, as staying standing would definitely have been too much of a challenge. He looked up at Crowley looming over him as he pulled his jumper over his head. Crowley seized Aziraphale’s arm and sucked in a breath between clenched teeth. Crowley must have had a miraculous touch, because suddenly Aziraphale could no longer feel any pain, he was aware only of those long, slender fingers wrapped around his forearm, holding it tightly. “Does it hurt?”

“Not really. Not now.”

“Ok, good. I’ll clean it up for you but you’ll need to go to the office and log it. You’ve had all your tetanus shots, right?”

“Of course.”

Crowley nodded and reached up onto the shelf to retrieve the first aid kit. _Why_? Why was he always _reaching_ for things or _bending over_ for things? How was that fair? Why was whatever he needed never just at a normal surface level? Aziraphale’s eyes once again drifted across the patch of skin at Crowley’s lower back that was revealed, and he licked his lips appreciatively.

Crowley knelt down on the floor beside the stool and flicked open the catch on the first aid kit, slipping on a latex glove and then ripping open a package containing an antiseptic wipe. He cradled Aziraphale’s arm with one hand while he used his gloved hand to clean the wound, focusing intently on Aziraphale, his brow furrowed with concentration. Aziraphale tried his very best to keep breathing slowly and rhythmically as he watched the slow and careful movements of Crowley’s hand over his skin. It was almost _tender_ , and left Aziraphale’s heart racing.

Crowley applied a dressing to the wound and gave Aziraphale a sympathetic smile as he left the hut. On his way out, Aziraphale made eye contact with the fluffy red-ruffed lemur that had bitten him, a great big bugger named Fuzzles, and couldn’t help but cast him a reluctant, but vaguely grateful, smile.

Aziraphale flicked the switch on the microphone, just about to start his penguin talk, when he felt a sharp pain right in the middle of his upper back. He squeezed his eyes shut, knowing immediately what had happened. It wasn’t the first time, and it almost certainly wouldn’t be the last, but even though Aziraphale was no stranger to being forcefully struck by seagull excrement, he was still surprised each time by quite how much it hurt. Aziraphale switched off the microphone, picked up his bucket of fish and ran down the steps, slinking into the tiny kitchen beneath the enclosure.

Crowley was there, _obviously_ , crouched down and feeding a fish to Skipper, a penguin that had been isolated from the others and was receiving veterinary treatment for bumblefoot.

“There you go, sweetheart. Tasty, right? Don’t worry, I’m sure they’ll have you out of here and back in the big pool with all your friends in no time.”

Aziraphale’s lips quirked into a fond smile. He loved watching Crowley interacting with the animals, he was absolutely adorable, and with the _kids_ , good Lord, Crowley was amazing with kids, always taking the time to stop whatever he was doing and answer all their questions.

“Crowley?”

Crowley twisted around towards the door, again looking Aziraphale up and down. “You ok?” he asked, with the tone of someone who had come to expect Aziraphale _not_ to be ok.

“One of the seagulls got me. Do you have any wipes or anything?”

“Yeah, of course,” Crowley chuckled. Perhaps someone was watching over Aziraphale because the wipes turned out to be stored in a drawer that could be opened without requiring any reaching or bending on Crowley’s part. Thank the Lord for small miracles.

“Thank you,” Aziraphale murmured quietly as he pulled a wipe from the packet Crowley was holding out towards him. Aziraphale wished there was more space in the kitchen so that he could move away from Crowley and do this a little more discreetly. He twisted awkwardly, trying to reach down from his collar, then gave up and tried from the other side, lifting the hem of his light blue polo shirt and sliding his arm up his back, still not quite able to reach the right spot. How had the seagull managed to strike him so precisely through the small gap at his collar, hitting him right in this unreachable spot on his upper back? He was starting to think he was cursed.

“Hey, let me do it for you,” Crowley chuckled. “Turn around. Probably easier if you take your shirt off.”

If Crowley was ever going to ask Aziraphale to take his shirt off, Aziraphale would very much have preferred for it not to be under these circumstances, but he really didn’t have much choice. He was by now already two minutes late to start the penguin talk.

“Thank you, you’re very kind.”

Aziraphale turned his back to Crowley and slowly extracted himself from his polo shirt, taking care not to smear it with seagull excrement. He wouldn’t be able to change into one of the office’s spare polo shirts until lunchtime, and he had two more talks to do before then. Aziraphale tensed with anticipation when he heard Crowley tug another wipe free from the packet, drawing in an involuntary shuddering breath when he felt Crowley press down firmly just below the nape of his neck, wiping him clean and doing a very thorough job of it too. Aziraphale shivered, and not because of the cool air in the penguin kitchen, his skin tingling all over.

Crowley extracted another wipe from the packet and went over the area again, followed by a third, now lightly sweeping it over him, the thin material providing the only barrier between Aziraphale’s skin and Crowley’s fingers.

“All done.” Crowley placed his hand on Aziraphale’s back for a second, his palm warm against Aziraphale’s cool, damp flesh.

“Thank you.”

Aziraphale hurriedly slipped his polo shirt back on, grabbed the microphone and the bucket of fish, and jogged up the steps to start his talk.

The next time Aziraphale was on the rota to do the animal talks, nothing embarrassing happened, thank God, but once again Crowley was on duty preparing the feed. Aziraphale was doing his gorilla talk, explaining that, contrary to popular belief, gorillas do actually make nests, pointing out the nesting material the keepers had provided in the sleeping area. The youngest gorilla was busy climbing up a red rope attached to one of the outdoor climbing frames, and many of the visitors that were gathered around listening to Aziraphale were pointing at it and smiling. It _was_ rather adorable, but not as adorable as _Crowley_ , who had been mobbed by a group of tiny school children on his way out of the primate kitchen, and was currently crouched down in front of them, grinning and talking animatedly about something. It was so hard for Aziraphale to force his eyes to scan his audience, rather than letting himself unwaveringly train them on Crowley.

At lunchtime, after the giraffe talk, Aziraphale walked back to the office and spotted Crowley along the way. He was sat on a bench by the wildfowl lake, with a whole cluster of ducks gathered around his feet as he scattered wheat on the ground around him. Aziraphale sighed, captivated as always by Crowley’s smile and the way his hair shimmered in the sunlight, and wished he had the courage to ask if he could sit with him.

That afternoon, Aziraphale was contacted on his radio and asked to go to the office once his talks were over. When he got there, he was informed that one of his colleagues had gone home sick, and so he was asked to fill in for her running the ‘close encounter’ session at the end of the day. The ‘animal of the day’ that visitors would have the opportunity of meeting up close and personal today was Noah’s Ark’s royal python, Crawly.

Right. Fine. Aziraphale could do this. Of course he could. It would be fine. He worked at a _zoo_ for heaven’s sake, he couldn’t very well continue to harbour an irrational fear of snakes.

The only ‘close encounters’ Aziraphale normally had with any of the animals were with those in the petting zoo, which he sometimes liked to visit on his lunch breaks. Occasionally, he did mini magic shows there in the school holidays, pulling a particularly tolerant fluffy white rabbit, named Harry, out of his magic hat. Aziraphale had actually spotted Crowley watching one of his performances once with a beaming smile on his face, and Aziraphale had hoped any redness showing as a result of the burning he felt in his cheeks could be explained away by the heat of the summer’s day.

Aziraphale’s stomach was churning as he pushed open the door into the reptile and amphibian house, fumbling about with his keys to find the correct one to unlock the door to get into the backroom hidden away behind the enclosures. Finally identifying the right one, Aziraphale let himself in and closed the door carefully behind him, heading over to Crawly’s enclosure and watching him through the glass. He wasn’t up to much, coiled up tightly beneath the heat lamp, but his forked tongue was flicking out occasionally. Aziraphale actually felt guilty for disturbing him.

Aziraphale fetched the plastic container he would be using to transport Crawly to the close encounter area and opened the lid, getting as ready as he could before unlocking the glass sliding door at the back of Crawly’s enclosure. He was stood with his key poised over the lock when the door to the backroom opened, and of course, _of course_ , Crowley walked in, just in time to see Aziraphale panic over picking up a snake. Brilliant.

“Hello Aziraphale! Don’t normally see you in here!”

“Oh, hello. No, I...” Aziraphale momentarily forgot how to speak as Crowley pulled his hair loose from its bun, absentmindedly running his fingers through it and settling it around his face. Good Lord he looked _incredible_. “Anathema had to go home sick, I’m afraid. I’m covering the close encounter.”

“Ah, so you’re here for the beautiful Crawly?”

“Yes, I am.” Aziraphale had lowered his hand from the lock when Crowley walked in, and was now nervously fiddling with his keys.

“You ok?” Crowley asked softly, tilting his head. Maybe there would be a day, just _one day_ , when Aziraphale would encounter Crowley at work without it ending up with Crowley having to ask him that.

“Perfectly. Tip-top. Absolutely tickety-boo!”

Crowley chuckled and smiled at him. “You’re not scared of Crawly, are you?”

“Well... I... maybe a little. I’ve never handled a snake before. I’ve been shown how to, of course, but I’ve never actually had to do it.”

“He’s a sweetheart, you’ve got nothing to worry about. Let me show you.”

Crowley unclipped his own keys from one of the belt loops on his khakis (and Aziraphale’s gaze might very well have followed Crowley’s hand as he did so, admiring once again how he looked in those incredibly tight trousers) and swiftly identified the right key, turning it in the lock and sliding back the glass panel.

“Hello precious, it’s ok, up you come, darling.” Crowley gently smoothed his hand along the snake’s coils and then gently pushed his palms beneath them to lift him up, and Crawly uncoiled immediately and started flicking his tongue out more insistently. “Hello sweetness, come and meet Aziraphale.”

The soft tone Crowley used to speak to the snake made Aziraphale’s heart clench and somehow beat even harder than it had been before. His keys were jangling quietly in his grasp, evidence that he was trembling, so Aziraphale shoved them back in his pocket and tried to summon the courage to get on with what he needed to do and not make any more of a fool of himself in front of Crowley than he already had, on _far_ too many occasions.

“Sit down if you like,” Crowley offered, gesturing to a chair in the corner of the room. Aziraphale nodded and sat down in the chair, Crowley following him with the snake. “Right, so you just need to keep both hands underneath to support him, one not too far back from his head and one about two-thirds of the way along his body so not too much of him is dangling down. He’ll keep moving but you can just keep adjusting your hands. When people come up to touch him, make sure they only stroke him down the length of his body, in the direction of his scales. Ok, ready? Put your hands out.”

Aziraphale had been slightly mesmerised listening to Crowley speak to him and blinked rapidly to shake himself out of it. “Oh... all right.”

Aziraphale held his hands out at what seemed like an appropriate distance apart, and Crowley placed the snake carefully on top of them, his fingers grazing Aziraphale’s in the process. Crawly very rapidly began slithering up Aziraphale’s arm.

“Move your hand, scoop him up so you can bring him back down.”

Aziraphale tried to reach his hand underneath Crawly, but the snake was moving very quickly, and was pressed tightly against Aziraphale’s arm, making it difficult for Aziraphale to push his hand underneath, and he was wary of hurting him.

“I can’t get my hand under him!” Aziraphale panicked as Crawly casually continued his exploration, working his way upwards to the nape of Aziraphale’s neck, his tongue flicking against his hair. “Crowley, please do something!”

“Hey, it’s ok, come here you curious thing, be nice to Aziraphale.” Crowley leaned in close, reaching down and forcefully pushing his hand underneath Crawly, his fingernails scraping along Aziraphale’s nape and over his hairline in the process. Aziraphale shivered and sucked in a shaky breath. “It’s ok, it’s ok,” Crowley murmured softly, and only when Aziraphale looked up did he see that Crowley was speaking to _him_ and not the snake.

“Sorry about that,” Aziraphale croaked.

“It’s ok, he can be a bit squirmy. He likes to slither up and cause trouble, don’t you sweetheart? You can see why I called him Crawly.”

“Oh, I didn’t realise you’d named him?”

“Yeah, I named all of the animals in here,” Crowley said proudly, letting Crawly drape himself over his shoulders. “You know the big ugly toad near the entrance? He’s called Hastur, and that weird-looking chameleon next to Crawly’s enclosure is called Ligur. They’re both sneaky little buggers so I named them after demons. All the green tree frogs look pretty much the same so I just call them all Eric.”

“Why did you get to name them all?”

“Well it’s my section, isn’t it? You know I’m a herpetologist, right?” Crowley asked, stroking his fingertip along the small snake tattoo near his ear, his hands free as Crawly had now slithered back down and settled himself comfortably wrapped around Crowley’s arm. “I specialise in the care of reptiles and amphibians. I spend most of my time here in the reptile house.”

“Oh, no, I didn’t realise. I so often see you with the other animals.”

“Well, all of the keepers have to prep the food for the talks about once a week.”

“I assumed you did it more often. Our shifts seem to overlap quite frequently.”

“Right, they do,” Crowley dipped his head and laughed under his breath. “That pretty corn snake on the other side of Crawly I actually named after _you_. He’s called Azirascale. Clever, right?”

Aziraphale’s eyebrows knitted together. “Why did you name him after me?”

Crowley shrugged and produced a series of unintelligible sounds from the back of his throat before answering. “Well, he’s really sweet, maybe a little bit shy, and he’s so clever, he knows how to do all sorts of things.” Through the glass doors at the back of the enclosure, Aziraphale could see the corn snake slithering around, and looked between him and Crowley with confusion. Crowley cleared his throat. “You ready to try again with Crawly? You can let him curl up over your arm like this, if you like? He’ll sit pretty still for you then.”

“Oh. Yes, all right.” Aziraphale’s racing mind diverted its attention from panicking about what to say to Crowley back to panicking about holding the snake. “He won’t squeeze too tightly will he? Isn’t that how they kill their prey?”

“Yeah, it is, but no, he’s very gentle, he’ll just hold on tight enough to feel secure.”

“Has he ever bitten anyone?”

“No, he’s a softie! Poor thing didn’t have the best start in life, he was rescued from an airport when he was about the size of a pencil, someone was trying to smuggle a box full of them into the country, sadly most of them didn’t make it. Crawly’s really friendly and he’s never hurt anyone, we wouldn’t send him out there for close encounters with the public otherwise.”

“Yes, that’s a very good point. All right, let’s try again.”

Aziraphale held his forearm out, and Crowley gently encouraged Crawly to wrap himself around it, his fingertips again grazing against Aziraphale’s skin in the process, sending electric shocks through his body. Once Crawly was settled, Crowley began stroking him affectionately, and the sight of Crowley’s fingers moving like that anywhere in the proximity of his arm left Aziraphale a little breathless.

“Don’t be nervous, you’re doing great.”

Aziraphale took a deep breath, and, content that Crawly was settled, looked up at Crowley, who was beaming at him. Aziraphale’s stomach did a few back flips and he clutched the side of the chair tightly with his free hand.

_It’ll be fine. You can do this._

“Thank you for your help, Crowley, but I must be getting on now, I don’t want to be late.”

Aziraphale rose from the chair and carried Crawly over to the plastic container. As he’d watched Crowley do, Aziraphale carefully pushed his hand beneath the snake and lifted him, encouraging him to unravel.

“Perfect, there you go!” Crowley grinned, and Aziraphale felt the colour rise in his cheeks. Once Crawly was safely deposited inside, Aziraphale fastened the lid on the box and placed a portable heat mat on top to plug in when they got to the close encounter area, before scooping the container up into his arms. Crowley stepped ahead of him and held the door open.

“Thank you again for your help. I really do appreciate it.”

“My pleasure, hope you have fun! Must say I’m a little jealous.”

“Oh, do you not get to handle him very often?”

Crowley laughed softly. “Not of _you_ , of Crawly! He gets to be held by you for an hour, and not only that, he even gets to hold onto _you_ a little bit.” Crowley winked, running his fingertips along Aziraphale’s forearm, and Aziraphale froze and clutched onto the plastic container like it was a life raft. He could actually relate to Azirascale then as he stared unblinkingly at Crowley, completely at a loss for words, his lips parting but no sound emerging from them. Crowley leaned in a little closer. “Would you maybe let me wrap myself around you sometime? I don’t bite either... unless you want me to.”

Aziraphale continued staring, focusing on trying to breathe, and Crowley tilted his head and pouted, imploring him to respond.

“Yes please,” Aziraphale croaked.

“Terrific.” Crowley grinned, then his eyes drifted over Aziraphale and he drew his bottom lip into his mouth. “Maybe you could join me for lunch tomorrow at the wildfowl pond? Bring some wheat for the ducks.”

“All right. Thank you. I will.”

“Great, I’ll see you there, then. Bye sweetheart,” Crowley waved through the side of the plastic container. “Be good for our lovely Aziraphale, won’t you? Have fun slithering all over him. You can tell me all about it later.”

Crowley grinned again and quickly raised his eyebrows before stepping back and closing the door, leaving Aziraphale stood there staring at it, trying to catch his breath.

_Right... well that was a thing._

**Author's Note:**

> Getting hit with seagull poo right down your shirt in that spot in the middle of your upper back that you can't really reach yourself? More likely than you think. Shout out to a certain red-haired zookeeper who scraped seagull excrement off that very spot on my back in a penguin kitchen many years ago. Cheers Ben, wherever you are now.
> 
> Thanks for reading this little bit of silliness, I hope you enjoyed it! :-)


End file.
